Monday 23 February 2015

Avocado leaf tips turning brown

Recently, I noticed that my 2nd and 3rd avocado plants have leaf tips turning brown. It started from the tip of the leaves and slowly moved towards the stalk. Small patches on the leaves also turned brown. It occurred on all the old leaves as new leaves start to emerge from the pruned area.

Leaf tip turning brown
Leaf tip turning brown
Leaf turning brown
Leaf turning brown
It could be due to salt accumulation and under watering. I water the plants every three days and maybe it needs another watering in between. See SG My Life Is Good blog on the avocado seedlings.

I did a research on the internet and found that it could be due to the two reasons that I have mentioned above. One way to remedy this is to flush the salt away from the soil by pouring water over the soil continuously until water comes out from the bottom of the pot. I poured about 1.5litres of overnight water over the soil and ensured that the water drained completely from the pot. I don't think that it is due to the sunlight because the plants are placed near the window but there is no direct sunlight. There are no strong winds except when I switch on the ceiling fan to the strongest and it can be quite strong. However, I don't think this is the reason but maybe due to the winds generated from the ceiling fan, the water in the pot dries up quickly. The browning of the leaf tip may be due to insufficient watering. I plan to water more frequently, so I'm going to water the plants every two days instead of three days. I may plan to place the plants under direct sunlight to see whether this will give better results but I doubt so. Since 2nd and 3rd avocado plants have leaf tip turning brown problem, I will take the 2nd plant and place it under direct sunlight in the weekend to see whether the browning slows down or stops completely.

Monday 2 February 2015

New bud growing from base of avocado leaf

New buds are growing out from the bases of the avocado leaves. It has been one month since I pruned the avocado seedlings. The cut area has healed nicely and the seedlings are doing well. I rotate the pots occasionally to let the leaves expose to the indirect sunlight. See my other post on the leaves bent towards the sunlight.

The third seedling is growing faster than the second seedling. I can see the leaflets forming distinctly in the third seedling. The leaves are not drooping and straighten up. I will need to do more research on how to prune the new buds. Maybe I will prune it when there are 3 leaves and snip away the tip when the time is right. Stay tuned to see the progress of growing avocado plant indoor.

New bud from 3rd seedling

New bud from 2nd seedling